In the past, it has been common to sinter ferrous steel mill fines and wastes into agglomerates which are then charged into a blast furnace or cupola. The sintering process, however, is confined to fine particles which must be initially screened and requires a large capital investment for the sintering plant. In addition, it necessitates the use of large amounts of fuel and results in considerable pollution which must be eliminated or controlled by costly apparatus. Furthermore, in the sintering process, magnetite present in the wastes is oxidized to hematite, thus increasing oxygen content in the agglomerate which is undesirable. Briquetting and pelletizing of waste products have encountered similar problems.
In an effort to eliminate the necessity for sintering, various process have been provided which agglomerate waste materials with the use of a binder at low or ambient temperatures. Various binders have been utilized; however, most of these have definite disadvantages such as expense, water solubility or non-compatibility with blast-furnace melting.